Friday, October 26, 2012

There are many large internet marketing firms out there that promise to link their customers' websites to other webpages throughout their network and list them in their directory as well. This is a form of SEO practice called "link building" which is very important when it comes to search page ranking. Link buyers beware: this certain form of link building is being targeted by Google through their algorithm changes made this year.

These web directories have been taking ranking hits this year as Google has rolled out the changes. It appears as if Google is trying to drive better link building strategies, in effect, saying that it is better to earn quality links than to pay for an inclusion in a directory or network. So what does this mean and how do we earn more valuable links?

Here's the logic behind link building: you have a business website that you are trying to rank higher on the web. By building links across the internet, you can generate more relevant traffic to your site by gaining links on highly trusted websites which essentially acts as a point or vote for your site. The key phrase is "highly trusted websites." You want to make sure that whoever is creating links to your site across the internet is doing so on trusted sites, otherwise, that link won't count as much or at all towards your site's ranking.

One way to build high trusted links that will most likely also drive traffic to your site is through social media. It's free to sign up and since so many people use social media sites, they are highly trusted on the internet. Web Crawl Consulting offers full social media marketing management for businesses looking for help in this area.

Another way, although not as strong, is through blog content writing and blog comments. By getting published on other sites, you are often allowed to include a link back to your website. Keep in mind that your blog and comments should be related to your website's industry.

Monday, October 22, 2012

I recently met with the manager of a business who was asking me how they can increase awareness of some changes to their location in order to drive more customers through the doors. We did a quick local search for them online using a few different keywords and based on those searches, their website wasn't even appearing on the first or second page. One thing to keep in mind is that they have had an active website for about 10 years now but their on-page SEO was non-existent and they are also not using social media to promote their business.

Next, we did a quick competitive analysis of a few related businesses who were appearing on page 1 of the search engine results. At first glance, the competition's websites weren't all that impressive in comparison. Then we took a look at the competition's social media activity... AND IT WAS BOOMING. One had over 1600 "likes" on Facebook and have been open for less than 2 years.

Social media is becoming ever more of an important factor in how a website is ranked by search engines. It's a great way to promote business by posting about daily events, promotions or even just to get the name out their and keep it on customer's minds. It's free advertisement but someone has to put in the work to gain those connections and keep the updates flowing on a regular basis. It is also a great way to gain referral web traffic to your main website. When you post something new on your social media page, include a link to your website. People are more likely to click on it to see if there is anything else new going on at your business. Of course, it also helps to keep your website updated on a continuous basis so that when the user does click on the website link, they are presented with new information that may drive them to your business.

I recently read an article from a popular Blogger who was talking about the new age of link building. Link building is the practice of obtaining links on other websites that refer viewers of that site back to your website. This is a very important practice in SEO. It's a way for one website to say, "Hey, I trust this other website to provide good and relevant information and I would recommend that you visit them." Search engines continue to change the way that they rank relevant links. The trend is slowly going towards social media linking whether it be through Facebook, Twitter or local places reviews such as Yelp! or Google Places. In the mind of the search engines, this new trend of link building provides more credible linking because it is a more social way gaining traffic to your site rather than paying to have your site listed in a large directory. It's also a way for other users to socially recommend your business and as many people know, the best customers are the ones that refer others to your business.

Friday, October 12, 2012

After making a few major updates to their algorithm in the past couple of weeks, Google announced again that they have made another update. This update is being referred to as "Top Heavy 2" and pertains to web page layout criteria. This update is expected to only impact a minimal amount of sites, but the reason for the update is to assign a lower rank to sites that are heavy with paid advertisements along the top tier of the each page. To rationalize, Google says that users want to see content related directly to their search as soon as they enter a website. This algorithm change will negatively impact those sites with a cluster of advertisements along the top portion of the site. The question now becomes: how much is too much?

The original update was ran back in January of 2012. Many webmasters, however, are reporting that they have been seeing more ranking changes related to this update between now and then which leads some people to think that there have been other updates since. Another issue is that with all of the recent changes that Google has made in recent weeks, some SEOs are complaining that they are all happening too close together (almost on top of each other) making it more difficult to keep websites current to algorithm guidelines.

As I see it, the only reason to place an enormous amount of ads on your page is to maximize potential revenue. It DOES mean that the user will have to scroll in order to find the relevant content within that particular site so I applaud Google on this change if it heightens the user's search experience.

Friday, October 5, 2012

There have been a couple changes implemented over the past couple of weeks by Google that affect search engine rankings . One, you may have noticed; and another that is not as apparent. Both are important and should be noted as Google continues to raise the bar on site ranking algorithms. In my opinion, these changes are going to make some people unhappy but at the same time, it is progress and theoretically, everything evens out in the end. It definitely keeps all SEO firms on our toes.

The most obvious change has been the decrease of links in the first page of search engine results from 10 to 7. Google claims that this only affects 20% of searches. What does this mean for SEO?

It means that a #8-10 ranking no longer guarantees a first page result. An SEO can no longer use the "Top 10 Rank" sales pitch.

It places more time to be spent on behalf of the SEO spot-checking rankings in the search engines (granted, it is a good idea to do this anyway).

It places more pressure on the SEO to provide better quality of work for their clients to ensure that their web pages rank well (this is a good thing).

It creates the need to keep your SEO employed (another good thing). SEO isn't just a "one and done" job. It takes time, effort, knowledge, effectiveness, etc. etc. etc.

There are SEO bloggers out there that say this could be Google running an analysis and there is no reason to think this will or will not be the standard rule for SERPs in the future. However, it is a good indication of what we might expect.

The second change is related to exact-match domains with low rankings. This change is expected to initially affect less than 3% of websites in the US-English markets. The purpose of this change is to keep low-quality domains with query-matching names from appearing in SERPs.

For example:You're shopping for widgets in San Antonio and you perform a search for "san antonio widgets." If a domain is www.sanantoniowidgets.com but does not rank well with Google, it should no longer appear just for the sake of domain name.

This is Google's effort to increase the relevancy of their search results. Just because the domain matches the search doesn't mean it will automatically appear on page 1. This may upset some of those people who invested a lot of money in buying a specific domain just for its name. This also tells us how much Google is really putting an emphasis on the importance of the site's content while driving away from the days when meta tag keywords played a huge role in site ranking.
Author: Michael Palmer